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1. Not until the final research paper was published ______ the full implications of the discovery.

2. The board's recommendation is that the new ethical guidelines ______ implemented without delay.

3. ______ formulated more precisely, the initial hypothesis might have averted months of fruitless experimentation.

4. The professor's lecture on quantum mechanics was so ______ that only a handful of advanced physics students could grasp its core concepts.

5. Despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary, the politician refused to ______ his controversial statement.

6. The study's findings are predicated ______ the assumption that the sample group is representative of the entire population.

7. The socioeconomic problems in the region are ______; solving one without addressing the others is an exercise in futility.

8. His critique of the novel was not a simple summary but a ______ dissection of its thematic and structural weaknesses.

9. The theory, ______ once considered revolutionary, has now been largely superseded by more comprehensive models.

10. Little ______ that their preliminary findings would catalyze a paradigm shift in the field of neuroscience.

11. The CEO's ______ remarks about the company's future did little to assuage the investors' concerns.

12. The rise of digital media has led to a ______ of information, making it difficult to distinguish credible sources from misinformation.

13. The new policy was implemented ______ the express wishes of the student body.

14. So intricate ______ the design that it was deemed impossible to replicate with current technology.

15. The philosopher argued that consciousness is not an epiphenomenon but a ______ property of complex neural networks.

16. The committee was forced to ______ the fact that their initial projections had been overly optimistic.

17. His arguments, ______ cogent, failed to persuade the more skeptical members of the panel.

18. The treaty's provisions were deliberately ______ to allow for varying interpretations by signatory nations.

19. A critical analysis of the text reveals a deep ideological schism ______ the author's ostensible neutrality.

20. The incumbent's failure to address the economic crisis was the ______ for his electoral defeat.

21. Were the government ______ its policy on carbon emissions, it would face significant international backlash.

22. The archeological evidence seems to ______ the historian's theory about the settlement's origins.

23. Rarely ______ such a confluence of economic and political factors leading to a global recession.

24. The research aims to move beyond a ______ understanding of the issue and delve into its root causes.

Bài đọc hiểu

The Nature of Scientific Revolutions

Thomas Kuhn's 1962 work, *The Structure of Scientific Revolutions*, presented a formidable challenge to the traditional, linear view of scientific progress. Prior to Kuhn, the prevailing philosophy, largely influenced by Karl Popper, held that science advances through a process of falsification, where theories are rigorously tested and discarded if proven false, leading to a steady accumulation of knowledge. Kuhn, however, proposed a more disruptive model. He argued that science operates within 'paradigms'—comprehensive frameworks of theories, methods, and assumptions that define a particular scientific discipline at a given time. 'Normal science,' as Kuhn termed it, is the day-to-day work of scientists solving puzzles within the existing paradigm. However, over time, anomalies—phenomena that the current paradigm cannot explain—accumulate. When these anomalies become too significant to ignore, a crisis ensues, leading to a 'paradigm shift' or a scientific revolution. This is not a mere refinement of the old theory but a radical break, where the fundamental axioms of the field are overthrown and replaced. A key and controversial aspect of Kuhn's thesis is the idea of 'incommensurability,' which suggests that successive paradigms are so different in their core concepts and language that they are essentially mutually incomprehensible. Proponents of different paradigms, in a sense, 'live in different worlds.' This view complicates the notion of objective progress, suggesting that what is considered a scientific 'fact' is contingent on the prevailing paradigm, a perspective that continues to provoke debate in the philosophy of science.

1. What is the primary purpose of this passage?

2. According to the passage, 'normal science' is best described as:

3. The word 'formidable' in the first sentence is closest in meaning to:

4. What does Kuhn's concept of 'incommensurability' imply?

5. What triggers a 'crisis' in a scientific field, according to Kuhn?

6. It can be inferred from the passage that the author views Kuhn's theory as:

7. The passage contrasts Kuhn's model with Popper's by highlighting their different views on:

The Chinese Room Argument and Strong AI

The philosophical discourse surrounding artificial intelligence (AI) has long been preoccupied with the notion of consciousness. Can a machine truly think, or merely simulate thinking? Philosopher John Searle's 'Chinese Room' thought experiment, first published in 1980, offers a potent critique of the 'Strong AI' hypothesis—the claim that a sufficiently complex and appropriately programmed computer could possess a mind and consciousness in the same way a human does. Searle imagines himself inside a locked room, equipped with a comprehensive rulebook in English. Through a slot, he receives pieces of paper with Chinese characters, which he does not understand. Following the rulebook's instructions, he manipulates these symbols and passes corresponding Chinese characters back out. To an outside observer, the room appears to understand Chinese, providing intelligent answers to questions. However, Searle himself, the 'CPU' of this system, has zero semantic understanding of the conversation; he is merely manipulating uninterpreted symbols. This analogy is intended to demonstrate that even if an AI system, like the one in the room, can pass a Turing test for intelligent behavior, it does not necessarily follow that it understands or has any intentional states. The system exhibits syntactic prowess—the ability to manipulate symbols according to rules—but lacks semantics, the actual meaning behind those symbols. Searle contends that this gap is unbridgeable for a purely computational system. While critics argue that the system as a whole (Searle, room, and rulebook) understands Chinese, or that the experiment's setup is flawed, the Chinese Room remains a cornerstone argument, compelling AI proponents to grapple with the profound distinction between symbolic processing and genuine cognitive awareness.

1. What is the central argument of Searle's 'Chinese Room' experiment?

2. The term 'Strong AI' hypothesis refers to the idea that a computer can:

3. In Searle's analogy, the person inside the room represents:

4. The passage distinguishes between 'syntactic prowess' and 'semantics' to highlight:

5. The word 'potent' in the first paragraph is closest in meaning to:

6. What is the author's attitude towards the Chinese Room argument?

7. According to the passage, a key criticism of Searle's argument is that:

8. Statement: Searle's experiment proves that no AI can ever pass the Turing test.

The Post-Structuralist Critique of Authorial Intent

In the landscape of 20th-century literary theory, few essays have been as provocative as Roland Barthes' 1967 'The Death of the Author.' This work stands as a seminal text of post-structuralism, mounting a direct assault on the traditional critical practice of interpreting a text by recourse to the author's biography, intentions, and psychological state. For the traditional critic, the author was the ultimate source of meaning, a god-like figure whose intentions provided the definitive key to unlocking the text's secrets. Barthes argues for a radical inversion of this hierarchy. He proclaims that the 'birth of the reader must be at the cost of the death of the Author.' By this, Barthes does not mean a literal demise, but rather the dissolution of the author as the sovereign authority over meaning. He posits that a text is not a single line of words releasing a single 'theological' meaning (the 'message' of the Author-God), but a 'multi-dimensional space in which a variety of writings, none of them original, blend and clash.' The unity of a text, therefore, lies not in its origin—the author—but in its destination: the reader. Meaning is not something to be 'deciphered' but is instead continuously and actively produced by the reader in the act of reading. This perspective shifts the focus from a static, author-centric interpretation to a dynamic, reader-centric one, where the text becomes a tissue of citations and cultural codes that the reader, a subject also woven from these same codes, brings to life. While liberating for interpretation, this view has been criticized for potentially leading to interpretive anarchy, where any reading, no matter how unfounded, can be deemed valid.

1. What is the main argument presented in the passage about Barthes' 'The Death of the Author'?

2. The phrase 'recourse to the author's biography' refers to the practice of:

3. What does Barthes mean by the 'birth of the reader'?

4. The word 'seminal' in the first sentence is closest in meaning to:

5. According to the passage, a potential criticism of Barthes' theory is that it could lead to:

6. How does Barthes view a literary text?

7. It can be inferred that the 'traditional critic' mentioned in the passage would likely: